Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

The interwebs are all atwitter with the sound of rotting corpses, gnashing teeth, and ...what? Jane Austen? Are you freaking kidding me?

From Quirk Books and the twisted mind of author Seth Grahame-Smith, who wrote How to Survive a Horror Movie, comes the romantic zombie-filled reimagining of Jane Austen's famous novel Pride and Prejudice. What may come as a surprise is that this new venture into the 1813 text includes zombies. Hence the unassuming title: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

This mash up takes the original text of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice and adds zombie excitement to every page. Although the book doesn't come out until May 19^th, 2009, the buzz building up around this small independently released book is nothing short of stunning. For its already short life span on Amazon, it has floated up and down the site's bestseller list.

This is because it's one of the few regency romances that a man can really sink his teeth into and enjoy. Need to find yourself a date and the clubs just aren't doing it for you? Take a copy of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies to the next book club meeting and it'll almost look like you're a sensitive kind of guy.

Here's the scoop: the novel begins with a plague that has infected Meryton, a village in England. This plague brings the dead back to life and they terrorize the town. Elizabeth, the protagonist, must destroy the zombies, but she is distracted from her quest by the arrival of Mr. Darcy. While fighting off his advances, she must also fight hordes of zombies scrambling for human flesh.

According to the publisher's website, the novel even includes 20 illustrations in the style of the original Pride and Prejudice illustrator, C. E. Brock. Pre-order your copy on Amazon so that you get your copy right when it comes in. Quirk Books is already temporarily sold out.

In addition to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, I am personally looking forward to the return of such classics as Oliver Twisted: Vampire (Please, sir, can I have some more...of your blood?!), Sense and Sensibility and Werewolves, and, my personal favorite, Far from the Madding Crowd...of Cannibals.

In fact, get out there and write your own mash up using copyright free texts from the web. A good place to start is Project Gutenberg which houses thousands of copyright expired texts. Have at it!

Is Jane Austen turning over in her grave? I hope so. I hope she claws her way back to the surface and her rotting corpse snags her own copy of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.